Boards and Committees

LPP Investments Board

Sally Bridgeland

Chair of the LPP Investments Board

Sally is well known in the UK pensions industry, for her thought-provoking views on risk, investment strategy and governance. She combines investment governance consultancy for Avida International with a number of complementary roles, including as a Non-Executive Director and Investment Committee Chairman at mutual insurance company Royal London; and trustee at both NEST Corporation and the Lloyds Bank pension schemes and at the Nuclear Liabilities Fund. Sally also serves on the Trust Investment Committee of the innovation foundation, Nesta and was the first lady Master of the Worshipful Company of Actuaries from 2016-17.

Sally was previously the CEO of BP Pension Trustees Limited. Before joining BP, Sally spent twenty years with Aon Hewitt as a Pensions Actuary and in the investment practice, where she led a number of research initiatives.

Michael O’Higgins

Chairman of LPP Partnership Holding Company Board, Non-Executive Director on LPP Investments Board and Member of the LPP Remuneration and Nomination Committee

Michael O’Higgins is also Chairman of Calculus VCT, the Channel Islands Competition and Regulatory Authorities, as well as a non-executive director of Network Rail and of the pensions company Hedgehog. He became the ‘Independent Person’ for Tunbridge Wells Borough Council in October 2015. He was Chairman of The Pensions Regulator from 2011 to 2014, Chairman of the Audit Commission from 2006 until 2012 and Chairman of the NHS Confederation from 2012 until 2015. He was also a non-executive director (NED) of HM Treasury and Chair of the Treasury Group Audit Committee from 2008 to 2014.

Michael was the Chair of the youth homelessness charity Centrepoint from 2004 to 2011. Previously, Michael was a Managing Partner with PA Consulting, leading its Government and IT Consulting Groups,latterly as a Director on its International Board. Prior to that he was a partner at Price Waterhouse, worked at the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development in Paris and held academic posts at the University of Bath, the London School of Economics, Harvard University and the Australian National University.

Robert Vandersluis

Robert Vandersluis is Director of Global Pension Investments at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), where he manages over £10 billion of investments and a substantial derivative portfolio. At GSK, Robert sits on a number of pension boards, and he provides strategic advice to GSK’s pension fund trustees in Europe, the United States, and Japan. Robert established GSK’s London-based pension investment department, where he developed and implemented GSK’s interest rate and inflation hedging strategies.

Robert’s previous roles include senior treasury and corporate finance positions at Affinity Sutton Group and FCE Bank plc. He also served on the board of the Pensions Trust, where he was deputy chair of the investment committee.

Robert studied economics and public policy at the London School of Economics, the University of Michigan, Cambridge University, and Harvard University’s Kennedy
School of Government.

Chris Rule

Managing Director (Investments) & Chief Investment Officer

Chris is Managing Director (Investments) & Chief Investment Officer for LPP, having previously held the role of Chief Investment Officer for one of the LPP’s clients, the London Pensions Fund Authority, since October 2014. Chris is responsible for managing LPP’s client assets, developing and enhancing LPP’s investment strategy, overseeing the investment team and monitoring the operational and business performance of the investment business. Working with colleagues at the Northern Pool, Chris founded and manages GLIL Infrastructure Ltd, a £1.3 billion joint venture investing direct into UK infrastructure assets.

Chris has a wealth of investment experience within asset management businesses. He has held a number of senior positions including Head of Alternatives at SEB Investment Management (Stockholm’s Enskilda Bank), as well as founding and co-managing the multi-strategy team whilst a Principal at Old Mutual Asset Managers (UK) Ltd. Chris originally trained as a risk manager at GNI Fund Management, where he went on to take investment management responsibility for their hedge fund portfolios.

Mike Jensen

Co-Chief Investment Officer

Before joining LPP, Mike was Chief Investment Officer for Lancashire County Council and Lancashire County Pension Fund since 2009, having previously held a similar role with Cornwall County Council. At LPP, Mike is responsible for managing LPP's client assets and a team of analysts.

Mike graduated in Physics with Economics from Imperial College London, and has over 30 years of experience as a rates, currency and fixed-income trader, as well as experience in debt and capital markets having established the Euro-Commercial paper and the Euro-Medium Term Note operations at Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch. Mike has held a number of senior roles across a wide range of investment trading and management businesses including rates proprietary trading, market-making, debt origination, structuring and risk management at Bank of America, UBS, Merrill Lynch, SG Warburg and Morgan Stanley.

Tom Richardson

Tom joined LPP in July 2016 from the Maple Financial Group, where he spent almost 20 years building his skills in different parts of the business. From 2008, he was the Chief Risk Officer (Market Risk), Global, a role that saw him driving the management and communication of the Group’s business line policies within an economic capital framework totalling £400 million.

Tom’s areas of responsibility included the measurement and reporting of financial risk where he led the design and implementation of risk methodologies, policies and procedures to meet both internal and regulatory objectives, including Value at Risk, Credit Capital at Risk, scenario analysis and
stress testing.